Balance hormones
Hormones play an essential role in controlling the rate of your metabolism and fat storage. If you are experiencing symptoms like fatigue, low libido, or chronic inflammation in addition to a weight loss plateau, it could be due to a hormone imbalance.
To ensure optimal hormonal health, consider consulting with a specialist and undergoing routine hormone tests, such as:
- Thyroid panel
- Sex hormones (testosterone, estrogen, progesterone)
- HbA1c & blood glucose
- Cortisol
- DHEA
The body can also develop a resistance to hormones that control appetite, such as leptin. If you’re leptin resistant you may feel hungry even though you just ate, and have trouble controlling cravings. Healthcare providers don’t normally test for leptin levels though, and not all laboratories offer it.
Your CentreSpringMD provider can help you determine which hormone testing options are right for you.
Enhance fat metabolism with IV therapy
IVs are a natural way to boost your metabolism and help you burn more body fat. That’s because many of the vitamins and minerals in IV therapy cocktails directly affect fat metabolism, such as magnesium, L-carnitine, vitamin C, and B-complex vitamins.
Intravenous (IV) vitamin infusion therapy is a fast, easy, safe way to maximize the effects of a healthy lifestyle by delivering nutrients straight to the cells that need them while bypassing slow and inefficient digestion processes.
Learn more about how IV therapy can enhance fat metabolism.
Drink more water
Good hydration plays a critical role in weight loss, detox, muscle building, and recovery. Staying hydrated can help you lose more weight, even without changing any other parts of your diet or exercise (3).
Drinking water stimulates the metabolism and energy expenditure which may help you lose weight. Upping water intake appears to also stimulate lipolysis, or the process of breaking down body fat for fuel (4).
Aim for at least half your body weight in ounces of water per day, and more if you’re active. Herbal tea, green smoothies, and some fruits are also helpful to stay hydrated.
Reduce cortisol with rest & stress relief
Elevated cortisol levels are associated with increased fat around the belly, which is often the one area most people wish to target when trying to lose weight. The biggest factor that ramps up cortisol production is nothing other than our good friend, chronic stress.
Researchers have also identified a stress-related protein known as betatrophin that makes it difficult to break down body fat and lose weight (5).
To reduce cortisol levels and allow your body proper recovery:
- Get adequate sleep (7 to 9 hours per night to support weight loss)
- Take a rest day from working out
- Adjust exercise intensity
- Try stress management techniques like deep breathing or meditation
About 1 in 3 adults in the U.S. don’t get enough sleep, and this can slow metabolism and wreak havoc on hormone levels, both of which are key in achieving optimal fat loss. Aim to get 7-9 hours of uninterrupted sleep each night. This should help you push past any weight loss plateaus you may be having.
Read: The Best Morning Routine for Metabolic Health
Incorporate strength training
Strength training helps build and maintain lean muscle, which is key to losing weight and improving body composition at any age. Muscle also burns significantly more calories at rest than fat does, igniting your metabolism. Unfortunately, muscle mass also decreases at a rate of 3 to 8 percent every decade on average after age 30, according to research (6).
Loss of lean muscle mass results in resting metabolic rate (RMR) reduction of 2 to 4 percent per decade (7), which means you’ll gradually require fewer and fewer calories to power your metabolism if you’re losing muscle.
You can break a weight loss plateau with functional medicine
Maintaining weight loss can be challenging, but the right tools can help you adapt your routine to reach your long-term goals.
Hitting a weight loss plateau could be a sign to re-evaluate important body functions, like your hormones, gut function, or sleep quality. When you improve these through diet, lifestyle, or treatment with functional medicine you’ll experience better overall health and a continued improvement in body composition.
Your integrative team at CentreSpringMD can help you uncover your weight loss roadblocks so you keep seeing results and steer clear of a plateau.
Resources
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9666105/
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7333005/
- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24179891/
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4901052/
- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26569053/
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2804956/
- https://aahf.info/the-muscle-loss-and-weight-gain-connection